


Blood

by Huggle



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Betrayal, Bobby Singer is a dad to Team Free Will, Community: spnkink_meme, Cruel Dean, Dark, Dark Dean Winchester, Ending could be triggery, Helplessness, Hurt Sam Winchester, Imprisonment, M/M, Non-Consensual Blood Drinking, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Non-Consensual Touching, Protective Bobby, Rape, Rescue
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-06
Updated: 2017-12-04
Packaged: 2018-10-15 19:34:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10556540
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Huggle/pseuds/Huggle
Summary: When Dean finds out that Sam didn't really search for him during his time in Purgatory, Sam thinks he can rebuild their relationship. He thinks he can make it up to his big brother. Unfortunately, Dean has the same idea - just a different way for Sam to go about it.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> For another prompt @ SPN, requesting Dean's dark reaction when he finds out Sam didn't search for him in Purgatory and what he decides to do about it. Or, when he decides Benny's a better brother than Sam is.

There are things Dean isn’t telling him.

Sam figures he shouldn’t be surprised. The moment he opened up, Dean shut down, and he wonders what he honestly expected. Dean went to Hell for him, and he casually admitted he gave up searching for him after a couple of minutes.

Oh, it wasn’t that simple, but he can see that to Dean it was.

He gave up – whether it was after a day or a month or a year, the fact that he stopped searching is all that matters.

He doesn’t give up now, though. He cooks for Dean – badly. He brings him beer, and cleans out his wounds, and tries to soothe him during the bad dreams that have him screaming one name in fear and anguish.

A name that isn’t his, a name that leaves Sam sobbing quietly while Dean settles, because he didn’t get all his family back. And that’s one of the things Dean isn’t telling him.

What happened. Why… Why he only made it back alone.

But soon there are other things. Phone calls that Dean needs to take outside, or rejects without answering if Sam’s too close or they’re in the middle of an interview. Odd absences, sometimes for a few hours and twice for a whole day, with no explanation offered although Sam does ask.

Not demandingly, just… He’s worried, he wants to make this right, but it’s like Dean hates him now and he’s handling it in typical Dean fashion, by keeping Sam close enough to guard but far enough away to punish.

If this is how things will be, Sam will take it. It’s enough – it will be enough to have him back. And if he owes penance then he’ll pay it.

He has no idea that Dean has that same idea in mind.

**

“Here,” Dean says, and sets the beer down in front of him.

Sam startles, because it’s the first time in days that Dean’s spoken to him when it wasn’t absolutely necessary. 

And on top of that…the beer.

Sam almost can’t take it. He watches Dean sit down across the table, nursing his own drink, watching him.

Like Dean isn’t sure if he’s destroyed any chance of finding their bond again.

Sam picks up the bottle and drains half of it in one go.

“We could order pizza,” he says, and it’s lame, but he’s needed this so badly and he was sure Dean would hold him at arm’s length for forever.

“Finish that first,” Dean insists. He takes a small gulp of his own.

Eager, Sam does. His throat feels parched, and the beer a little frothier than usual. And it goes to his head fast, but then he hasn’t eaten all day, and to be honest he’s probably just giddy that Dean’s giving him another chance here.

But by the time the bottle’s empty, he’s starts to feel hot. His stomach aches and there’s a dull pressure building in his head.

“Dean, I don’t feel so good,” he says, but his words come out slurred and low.

Dean gets up, but he doesn’t come over. “I know, Sam, I know. Just don’t fight it, ok?”

Sam starts to slide down the chair. He ends up sitting on the floor, only the chair keeping him upright. All he can do is stare up at his brother, and try to get his head around what’s so obviously happened.

But he can’t. Not because he’s sick. Not because it feels like someone’s wrapping his head in plastic, making it hard to see and hear and breathe.

No, he can’t because there is no way it’s possible.

No.

**

Benny, Dean tells him, is the reason he made it out of Purgatory alive.

Sam learns more about the vampire in the next two weeks than he needs to know. He learns that Benny was turned against his will, many years ago, and then killed by his sire. He learns that he sought Dean out in that damned place, and helped him – reluctantly – find their angel.

Then they lost him again, and Sam watches Benny’s sly, slow movements and wonders if that was misfortune or design.

But when Benny’s teeth puncture his skin, when he feels the hot pain of his blood being sucked out, when he can feel Benny swallowing, all he can think of then is that Dean didn’t make it out of Purgatory.

Something might have, but it isn’t his brother. 

His brother wouldn’t be keeping him drugged, restrained and helpless for a vampire to use as a blood bank.

His brother wouldn’t gag him every time Bobby calls, and find excuses and reasons why Sam can’t come to the phone, why Bobby can’t come by – when it’s his damn cabin – and why they can’t come to him.

No. That isn’t Dean.

Sometimes, when Sam’s entire body is a mess of sluggishly healing bites, Dean will set up a bag and some tubing and drain off a pint or so. It’s become so much more effective than the drugging to use blood loss to keep him weak, and it stops that bastard complaining that the blood tastes 'funny’.

Sam hopes he chokes on it. He wonders if there’s a way he can concoct something to take so that the next time Benny drinks, the taste will be the least of his worries.

But they watch him all the time, and he isn’t strong enough to walk most days.

No. If he’s getting out of here, he’s going to need help.

But their angel is gone. Bobby seems to be somehow convinced they’ve mended their broken fences and that Sam’s just permanently too busy to come to the phone.

There is no one else who’d care enough to save him.

**

It doesn’t go beyond feeding until Dean drives out one afternoon, whining about cabin fever and a need for some company prettier than the prize specimens he’s currently sharing accommodation with.

Sam’s been waiting for it. He knows the close link between feeding and sex, the forced intimacy. He’s felt it, when Dean’s back was turned, and Benny’s reaction was so apparent as he pressed every inch of himself against Sam while he drank.

And he kids himself for a few seconds that he actually has half a chance. Despite his arms and legs trembling with the effort of standing, the nausea that burns up into his throat, the fact that he has no weapon.

But it ends like he supposes he knew it would. Benny shoving him face down onto the bed, drawing blood with the rough heaving motion, muttering something under his breath until all Sam can hear is his heartbeat pounding because he can’t breathe.

Then Benny grabs his hair and hauls his head back enough so he doesn’t suffocate before shoving him back down again.

When it’s done, Benny leaves him there. Sam doesn’t know he’s been bitten again until he feels blood running down his throat. 

He wants to move, to haul his pants up and get off the damn bed, find a blade and take Benny’s head.

But all he can do is lie there, and he’s still there when Dean comes back.

Surely, Sam thinks, surely this will be that step too far. He watches Dean as he comes in, stops sharp and stares.

Benny gets up slowly, and Sam can feel the sudden tension. The vampire’s worried.

“This gonna be a problem, brother?”

Dean’s gaze shifts from Sam and his next words hurt worse than anything he’s endured so far. Than everything.

“Just save it for when I’m not here. Cover him the fuck up, dude.”

Benny chuckles, and tugs the sheet out roughly from under Sam. He tosses it clumsily over him, and then goes back to sit with Dean.

Sam passes out finally, to the sound of small talk and laughter.

**

Maybe a month after Sam woke up to find a vampire fastened on his neck, and realised his brother was calmly watching, he spikes a fever.

It’s high and he feels like he’s boiling alive. They run him a bath and fill it with water as cold as they can get and strip him and dump him in. Dean’s meticulous in cleaning out the bites – not the other damage though, the damage Dean pretends doesn’t exist and so does nothing about - but Sam figures a few got infected and the pilfered meds they’ve stuffed him with have done no good at all. 

So yay for anti-biotic resistance, he thinks, drunkenly, as they haul him out and dump him on a sheet on the floor.

He shivers as he stares up at them, wondering if maybe he’ll get out of this without help after all. He’d have preferred to take Benny with him, but sometimes you have to settle for what you can get.

That’s when he hears someone thumping at the door.

Dean curses and starts towards it, hesitating only when he seems to remember his naked brother is lying helpless on the floor. He tugs the bathroom door over, mutters something to Benny, and then goes to see who it is.

A couple of moments pass, and Sam can see Benny getting antsy.

But what can he do? Stay here, he doesn’t know what’s happening. Go out, and risk giving away their horrible little secret.

Sam thinks about crying out, but he doesn’t know who’s out there, and if it’s friend not foe, or an innocent party, that person will be dead soon after. Or worse, they’ll share Sam’s fate.

Or replace me, he thinks, because he has a feeling that he’s probably not going to make it through the night.

The door swings open suddenly, and Benny snarls. Something whistles through the air, and though Sam’s too weak now to turn his head, he hears something thud to the floor. Then something heavier follows.

He grins stupidly. He’s heard many a body fall in his time, and he knows exactly what that was. 

Then someone’s leaning over him, blocking out the meagre light from the dull bulb. He can’t make out their features – damn, it’s dark – but there’s something familiar.

“Damn it, boy,” the man says. “Get the hell over here.”

I am here, he wants to protest, but the man’s looking back so Sam figures he’s addressing someone else.

Not that it matters, he thinks. It’s over, one way or the other.

“Thanks,” he whispers, and even that drains him. It’s colder than ever and he can’t really see anything now.

“Sam? Sam, damn it, don’t you-“


	2. The Bond

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bobby comes to Sam's rescue, with help, but the question of what to do with Dean hangs over all of them.
> 
> Until someone provides an unwanted solution.

Rafael’s a good guy.

He showed up in town with only the clothes he stood up in and, since strangers often meant trouble, Bobby took an interest.

But nothing drew a reaction from the fella, and as the days passed, Bobby learned his background. He’d come out of Guerrero, over the border and then hitching his way across the country in the hope of finding somewhere to settle.

He ended up in Sioux when he literally couldn’t go any further, and Bobby’d like to say his town was a welcoming place for a young guy with literally no place else to go.

Damn what his neighbours think (Bobby isn’t that keen on most of them anyway). He isn’t exactly rolling in it but he could use help at the yard sometimes, and Rafael is a fast learner.

He also knows a little about the supernatural and, once he sees a few things around Bobby’s that nobody else would bat an eye at because they just look like weird art or a really old sword, Rafael tells him some of the stories from his home town. 

He’s not a hunter, but he’s heard tell of some, and he knows for sure that ghosts and demons aren’t just things you see on TV.

Bobby really likes him. He reminds him of Dean, a little, but also of a young Sam. 

So it’s to Rafael he turns when he realises Castiel is lost to them. He gets a little drunk, which is dumb, but he wakes up in the morning and finds Rafael has tidied up and made a start on the oil change for Mrs Dempsey’s old Volvo.

And it’s to Rafael he makes his concerns felt about not being able to speak to Sam.

It hurts that Dean has such a low opinion of him, thinking he wouldn’t see through such damn obvious lies.

Trusting Rafael as he does now, Bobby’s kept no secrets from him, and he shares his worries that maybe Sam’s backslid somehow and Dean doesn’t want to tell him.

But a Sam hyped on demon blood would be too much for Dean to handle alone. He’d tell Bobby, and ask for help. Dean’s pride wouldn’t be worth enough for him to put his little brother at risk.

So it isn’t that. All the same, something’s very wrong, and Bobby can’t really wait any longer to do something about it.

But he can’t do it alone. He’s sure of that.

And since it seems Dean’s been lying about Sam, he wonders what else Dean’s deceived him over.

With Rafael’s help, he digs, and networks, and three days after that, the two of them draw a summoning circle in the middle of the den.

Bobby has nothing left to form a connection except himself, but that will be enough. A fatherly bond.

By the time it’s done, Bobby feels like he’s been turned inside out. 

That doesn’t matter, though.

Because it worked.

++

Sam doesn’t talk about what happened much.

That’s okay. Bobby doesn’t expect him to, at least not yet. Those boys were never good at sharing their feelings (another part of their inheritance from John), so the time will come or it won’t.

In the meantime, they’ve at least made sure Sam is healed (physically).

Bobby doesn’t miss how Sam practically sticks to Cas like glue. He’s fine with that. Anybody would be skittish after spending weeks imprisoned by their brother so they could be used as a blood bank for a vampire.

He can tell Sam wants to feel he’s safe, and Cas right now is the embodiment of that. Nothing is getting past the angel, and Cas even sits in Sam’s room when he’s asleep.

Bobby figures Sam’s having nightmares, and that Cas chases them away as soon as they start.

He wishes Cas could find a way to do that for him, but his nightmare is a waking one. He got one son back, only to lose another shortly thereafter.

And then he hates himself for thinking like that, because Dean isn’t dead. He’s downstairs, locked up tight in the panic room, but on his darker days Bobby’s willing to admit he’s all but given up on that boy.

Dean isn’t possessed. He isn’t cursed. He’s not insane, like Cas was after he took on Sam's madness.

But he’s not Dean either. Because Dean would die before he let anyone hurt Sam. He’d never choose anyone alive over his brother, rightly or wrongly.

Bobby doesn’t know all that happened to Sam, but the condition they found him in left little to the imagination. 

And Cas knows the extent of Sam’s injuries, because he healed them, but he won’t tell Bobby.

Bobby knows that without asking, that Cas won’t violate Sam’s privacy on top of all the other violations he’s likely suffered of late.

Besides, the look on Cas’s face was enough.

Dean would certainly never have let any of that happen, let alone orchestrate it.

And yet…

He did.

++

Bobby establishes rules about the panic room pretty much straight off.

Sam is not allowed to go down there. He isn’t sure if the boy would want to, anyway, but just in case.

Rafael shows no inclination to want to go downstairs at all. He was instrumental in rescuing Cas, and caring for the angel after; he kept the yard running while Bobby was planning Sam's rescue, and those first few days when everything felt like a disaster in the making.

But he sees how broken Sam looks, still, and knows that Dean is Sam’s brother, and seems to have decided that Dean is something he doesn’t want any part of.

All the same, the rules extend to him and Bobby makes that clear. Dean could be screaming blue murder, and neither of them are to go down there.

The same rules apply to Cas, and perhaps to him most of all.

Where Dean is concerned, Cas has no sense of self preservation, or even self interest. Bobby can’t exactly criticise; more than once, he’s pushed and pulled where Cas is concerned, and it’s a guilt that won’t really settle.

He intends to look after Cas from here on in, but the _bond_ Cas shares with Dean is powerful and Bobby knows he has to ….

Not break it, but limit the potential damage it could wreak.

Dean could work on Cas, and Bobby knows he’d wear Cas down eventually. Not that Cas would let Dean hurt Sam, or Bobby himself, but he might well let Dean hurt _him_ just by trusting him at the wrong moment.

Bobby would like to think Cas would be safe in Dean’s presence. But Sam wasn’t.

Sam endured a living hell for weeks.

So, no, Cas is not going down there either.

Bobby keeps at Cas until he gets an assurance. It doesn’t take as long as he expected, and it’s that night, when he’s lying awake…

Wondering how they came to this…

When he realises that says more about his relationship with Cas than Cas’s relationship with Dean.

++

Maybe a week or so later, Bobby thinks it’s time Sam went outside. His skin is the colour of copy paper, and that’s not going to change if he stays cooped up in the house.

Sam hesitates on the threshold, and Bobby doesn’t get it. The boy’d been a prisoner in the cabin for weeks; surely some natural light and some fresh air would have him champing at the bit to get out.

Still, with a little encouragement (and Cas shadowing him) Sam ventures out. They would probably go no further than a turn of the yard, but it’d be a start.

And, since today was Rafael’s day off, Bobby decides to take advantage of the opportunity.

He unlocks the door at the top of the stairs, and goes down.

Glancing through the peephole shows him Dean still wearing the the manacle around his wrist. It's ttached to a chain that is n turn welded to the bed.

It means Dean can use the toilet in the corner, and have a little give to move around. 

But the lock on the manacle is secured by magic, and only the person who knows the final word of that spell can unlock it. 

Dean won't get out of it, no matter how smart he is.

Bobby unlocked the door, and goes in. 

He doesn't offer any greetings, just puts down a tray with some soup and some water and backs away.

Dean hasn't had much to say during these visits. He seems sullen, most times. When Bobby comes back for his tray, he often finds Dean has done little more than pick at the food.

He’s definitely losing weight, but then his appearance is generally scruffier these days so it could be that.

Bobby hasn’t worked out how to let Dean shower and shave without also letting him get loose and either disappear or try to kill them all.

Today, it seems, Dean is in a chatty mood.

“Heard Sam screaming last night,” he says.

Bobby pulls up a chair from outside the door and takes a seat. Might as well.

“He okay?”

Bobby glares at him. “Oh, so suddenly you care?”

Dean shrugs. “Not a fucking chance. He deserted me, Bobby. He deserted _us_. I hope he’s fucking suffering up there, and I hope he keeps screaming so I know about it. It says a whole lot when a vampire’s a better brother to you than your own kin.”

Those words hit Bobby like a blow. But he knows what Dean expects. Bobby to get up and come over there and lash out in anger.

Maybe Dean would kill him. Maybe he wouldn’t.

It won’t be today that they find out. 

“Holler when you’re done,” Bobby says.

“Bobby, you can’t just keep me down here forever.”

Bobby gets up, and grabs the chair. “I guess we’ll need to see.”

But when he turns around, he isn’t expecting Rafael to be standing there.

It’s his day off, and Rafael knows the rules, and Bobby just stares stupidly at him.

“I”m sorry, Bobby,” Rafael says. “I really am.”

He has a gun in one hand, and a toolkit in the other. 

“What the hell are you doing, boy?” Bobby demands.

Rafael gives him a sad look. Like this is something he really doesn’t want to be doing, but things are how they are.

“What you won’t,” he says. “What you can’t.”

And Bobby looks from the gun to the toolbox, and back to Rafael. And he knows.

“You a goddamn idiot,” he says, and rushes him.

But it’s stupid. He’s old and he’s slow, and there’s a good ten feet between them and Rafael is ready.

Bobby doesn't feel the pain straight away. But he keels to the side, going down first to his knees and then toppling over.

He hears Dean yelling his name.

Blood’s leaking from his side. He presses his hand to the wound, feels the location.

Rafael’s a good shot.

“Cas will be back in time to heal you,” Rafael says. “You’ll be okay, Bobby. And I’ll take care of everything else. So that you’ll _all_ be okay.”

He stands up, and steps out of Bobby’s sight. Bobby tries to turn over, see what he’s doing, but his vision is already tinged with black.

The last thing he’s aware of is Dean cursing Rafael out, and then there’s nothing.


End file.
